Oxygen (Catfish And The Bottlemen/1975)

Van

I awoke but it didn't feel like waking up.

It felt like coming round having drowned, having been buried alive, having spend the night suffocating, unconscious in the rubble.

It was painful, everything sore, every breath strained and stinging. My eyes, my neck, my throat, all burning with the same dehydration, lethargy, agony.

Before I'd pushed myself up from my bedroom floor where I'd passed out my cheek pressed to the carpet, a string of salvia dried out and hanging from my lips, memories of the previous night washed over me in unforgiving waves.

Larrys kitchen, a bottle of bud, a cigarette, all my friends.

I couldn't bring myself to open my eyes and all hope diminished with the humiliation which took every fibre of my being and twisted it with embarrassment when I remembered Em. How badly I'd handled Em.

I reached out for my phone but my fingers scraped the floor and when I forced myself to roll onto my back, starring at the ceiling blankly as I shoved my hand into my pocket and found nothing once again I winced remembering the car.

For a minute or two I just lay there, unable to salvage even a shred of reason to move, too weighed down by regret. And then two minutes became 10 and 10 stretched out like a desert, 15, 20 minutes all as painful as the next and all I could do was think of her.

I tuned in and out of mums footsteps in the hall, the sound of her shifting the furniture round, reorganising the bedroom next door. I tuned into the sound of guests talking as their feet hit the stairs and the floorboards creaked beneath their weight.
I thought about getting up. Pictured myself walking downstairs into the kitchen, pouring a glass of water, I thought about how much better it would make me feel.

But I didn't get up for another hour.
I let myself wallow in it. The dry mouth, the head like a bruise, the nausea and the ache.

I closed my eyes and I tried to fall back asleep, tried to find the comfort of unconsciousness but it never came and so eventually I rolled over, swallowed the lump in my throat and pushed myself up off the floor.

My mother laughed when she saw me, she grinned as she poured me a brew, told me I was lucky the kettle had just boiled.

"Oh no," she giggled, "your face says a thousand words you know,"

I grimaced, wincing as my smile stung my chapped lips.

"You weren't fighting were you? You look a bit worse for ware Ryan...? She said then stepping closer to study my scrapes and scars. I shook my head and regretted it instantly.

"No, had a stumble on me way home," I spoke and my words came out wrong. My voice cracked and dropped an octave and I screwed my face up once again as she giggled some more.

"For gods sake Ryan," she laughed, "and here was me thinking yous had all grown out of that kind of silly behaviour,"

"Wishful thinking mam," I shrugged sipping my tea, "I think I'm gonna go back to..."

"Oh no you're not," she frowned, hands on her hips as she nodded to the calendar on the wall, "You're not getting out of it that easily, everyone's excited to see you!" She exclaimed.

"What... oh," I breathed, baby Emmas birthday. I let out a sigh and forced a smile. "Shower, I was gonna say shower," I said finally, shaking my head as my mum turned back to me, a brighter grin lighting her up as she clapped her hands and returned to work.

"Good, thats more like it, you make sure you're looking your best Ryan, none of that scruffy rock star behavior today, there'll be no hangovers at little Emmas birthday alright..."